The GES Newsletter Misrepresents My Position

Several months ago Ken Neff published an article in the GES newsletter Grace In Focus. The article was titled "What Is the Free-Grace Gospel?"¹ It is not my intention to give a full critique of Mr. Neff's article. Rather, I would simply like to clarify my position in the Free Grace gospel debate in response to Mr. Neff.

As I read Neff's article I was surprised to see that he listed me as one who held to "A Patchwork Content Approach" in the Free Grace gospel debate! Under the heading "A Patchwork Content Approach Is Not Convincing", Neff lumped me together with patchwork gospel advocates and said: "Jonathan Perreault has six essentials."

I have several problems with how Neff has portrayed my position:

1) Neff makes it appear as if I disagree with his first two observations. But in reality I agree with Neff's first two observations. I agree with the basic premise that "It Seems Arbitrary To Say That Some, But Not All Of The Good News Must Be Believed." I also agree that "A Patchwork Content Approach Is Not Convincing."

2) Neff makes it appear as if I am a "patchwork" gospel advocate. However, I have made it clear that I don't agree with the patchwork/partial gospel approach of Greg Schliesmann, Tom Stegall, and J. B. Hixson (see my summary chart: "Three Views On The Gospel of Grace").

3) Neff makes it appear as if I have proposed "six essentials". It should concern Neff that I don't even know what "six essentials" he is attributing to me!

4) Neff doesn't say where my supposed "six essentials" are found. If indeed I had proposed "six essentials", why doesn't Neff bother to cite them as he did for the others?

I believe that Ken Neff and the GES have seen my position in the Free Grace gospel debate quite out of focus. I would like to ask them to correct their distortion of my position, and to portray it more accurately in the future.


ENDNOTES:

¹ Ken Neff, Grace In Focus (March-April 2009).

The Cross Under Siege

In recent years Zane Hodges and the Grace Evangelical Society (G.E.S.) have redefined the gospel of salvation from "the word of the cross" (1 Cor. 1:17-18) to what some have called "the new crossless gospel."¹

Hodges himself did not always hold to his new view. I think this point needs to be emphasized more in the Free Grace gospel debate, because Hodges once denounced the position he eventually came to embrace. Below is a brief chronology of statements by Zane Hodges documenting his departure from the cross:

 

Classic Free Grace (1992)

"False doctrine...tell[s] us that it is dangerous—even wrong—to trust completely in what Christ has done for us in dying for all our sins (1 John 2:2; John 1:29)."²

"Either a man can look to the cross and find peace by believing, or he cannot....There is no escape from this conclusion. If I cannot trust completely in Christ and what He did on the cross, then the cross can give no peace about my eternal destiny."³

"[In John 3:14-16] Jesus means to say, He Himself will be lifted up on the cross, and the one who looks to Him in faith will live....So, in John 3, the issue is faith, or confidence, in Christ for eternal life. Will a man look to the Crucified One for eternal life, or will he not? The man who does, lives! By this very simplicity, the Gospel confronts and refutes all its contemporary distortions."⁴

Crossless Free Grace (2000)

"In recent years I have become aware of a way of presenting the gospel invitation that troubles me. I believe I have heard it from my earliest years, and I admit it didn't really bother me for a long time. Now it does. I have heard people say this: 'In order to be saved you must believe that Jesus died on the cross.' In the context of our present discussion, I mean that this is their summary of the requirement of faith. It is not just one item, among others, to be believed. Whenever I hear that nowadays, I get extremely uncomfortable."⁵

"Try to imagine an unsaved person marooned on a tiny, uninhabited island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. He has never heard about Christianity in his life. One day a wave washes a fragment of paper up onto the beach. It is wet but still partly readable. On that paper are the words of John 6:43-47. But the only readable portions are: 'Jesus therefore answered and said to them' (v. 43) and 'Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me has everlasting life' (v. 47). Now suppose that our unsaved man somehow becomes convinced that this person called Jesus can guarantee his eternal future, since He promises everlasting life. In other words, he believes Jesus' words in John 6:47. Is he saved? I suspect that there are some grace people who would say that this man is not saved because he doesn't know enough. For example, he doesn't know that Jesus died for his sins on the cross....My hypothetical unsaved man has just read the words of Jesus in John 6:47, "Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me has eternal life.' All this person needs to do is to believe that statement and eternal life is his."⁶

"Neither explicitly nor implicitly does the Gospel of John teach that a person must understand the cross to be saved. It just does not teach this."⁷

"People are not saved by believing that Jesus died on the cross; they are saved by believing in Jesus for eternal life, or eternal salvation."⁸

"Salvation is not the result of assenting to a detailed creed. Salvation does not even require an understanding of how it was provided for or made possible....The simple truth is that Jesus can be believed for eternal salvation apart from any detailed knowledge of what He did to provide it."⁹

Cultish Free Grace (2008)

"In offering eternal life, Jesus Himself never invited anyone at all to believe in...His death on the cross for our sins".¹⁰

"Theological legalism [i.e. Classic Free Grace] seeks to co-opt Free Grace theology. Indeed it masquerades as this kind of theology. But this claim is false."¹¹


ENDNOTES:

¹ Tom Stegall, "The Tragedy of the Crossless Gospel," The Grace Family Journal (Spring 2007): p. 9.

² Zane C. Hodges, The Gospel Under Siege (Dallas: Redencion Viva, 1992), p. 147, italics his. Editor's Note: Hodges' book The Gospel Under Siege was first published in 1981, before Hodges changed his gospel. According to Kenneth Wilson, "In his 1992 revised and enlarged edition of The Gospel Under Siege, Hodges inserted his altered gospel." (Wilson, The Heresy of the Grace Evangelical Society [Regula Fidei Press, 2020], p. 44.) In other words, the 1992 updated and expanded edition of The Gospel Under Siege still included many of Hodges' original statements about the gospel from the first edition. Thus Don Reiher can get away with saying that Zane Hodges didn't change his gospel; Hodges still included it in the 1992 edition. But in another sense, Hodges did change his gospel. Kenneth Wilson says: "This deviant [promise-only] gospel is verified in Hodges's second edition of The Gospel Under Siege (1992). There were five printing from 1981 through 1988. All of these five are exactly the same without additions or subtractions. Not one of these voiced the view that Hodges's new gospel created. It is only evident in the second edition of The Gospel Under Siege in 1992. Hodges altered his gospel to suddenly require belief in the promise, not the person. Now The Gospel was Under Siege by Hodges himself." (Wilson, The Heresy of the Grace Evangelical Society, pp. 30-31.)

³ Ibid., p. 148, italics his.

⁴ Ibid., pp. 18-19, italics his.

⁵ Zane C. Hodges, "How to Lead People to Christ, Part 2: Our Invitation To Respond," Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society 14 (Spring 2001): p. 9.

⁶ Zane C. Hodges, "How to Lead People to Christ, Part 1: The Content of Our Message," Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society 13 (Autumn 2000): 4; Hodges, "How to Lead People to Christ, Part 2: Our Invitation To Respond," Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society 14 (Spring 2001): pp. 11-12.

⁷ Zane C. Hodges, "How to Lead People to Christ, Part 1, The Content of Our Message," Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society 13 (Autumn 2000): p. 7.

⁸ Zane C. Hodges, "How to Lead People to Christ, Part 2: Our Invitation To Respond," Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society 14 (Spring 2001): p. 10.

⁹ Zane C. Hodges, "How to Lead People to Christ, Part 1: The Content of Our Message," Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society 13 (Autumn 2000): 10.; Hodges, "How to Lead People to Christ, Part 2: Our Invitation To Respond," Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society 14 (Spring 2001): p. 12.

¹⁰ Zane C. Hodges, "The Hydra's Other Head: Theological Legalism," Grace In Focus (September-October 2008).

¹¹ Ibid. Bob Nyberg correctly concludes: "Zane has narrowed down the definition of Free Grace theology to ONLY those who hold to his concept of the gospel which is 'believing in Jesus for eternal life.' According to Zane's limited definition of Free Grace theology, anyone who teaches that a person must believe that Jesus died on the cross for their sins is a promoter of Theological Legalism and does not teach Free Grace theology. In other words, Free Grace theology is the sole possession of Zane Hodges, Bob Wilkin and the Grace Evangelical Society. Anyone who does not buy in to their minimalist (aka Crossless) gospel, cannot be a Free Grace advocate." (Nyberg, "Zane Hodges and Theological Legalism," www.4himnet.com/bnyberg/Zane_Hodges_and_Theological_Legalism.pdf)